\n<\/p>\n
\n The Supreme Court on Monday declined an opportunity to overturn its landmark precedent recognizing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage<\/a>, tossing aside an appeal that had roiled LGBTQ advocates who feared the conservative court might be ready to revisit the decade-old decision.\n <\/p>\n \n Instead, the court denied an appeal from Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county clerk who now faces hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages and legal fees for refusing to issue marriage licenses after the court\u2019s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges<\/a> allowed same-sex couples to marry.\n <\/p>\n \n The court did not explain its reasoning to deny the appeal, which had received outsized attention \u2013 in part because the court\u2019s 6-3 conservative majority three years ago overturned Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to abortion that 1973 decision established. Since then, fears about Obergefell being the precedent to fall have grown.\n <\/p>\n \n The Supreme Court today is far different and far more conservative than the one that decided Obergefell in 2015, which is part of what had given LGBTQ advocates pause about the Davis appeal.\n <\/p>\n \n Justice Anthony Kennedy, the key swing vote who authored the Obergefell decision, retired in 2018 and was replaced by conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal icon who was also in the Obergefell majority, died in 2020 and was succeeded by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative.\n <\/p>\n \n Three current justices \u2013 Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito \u2013 were in dissent in Obergefell.\n <\/p>\n \n Kennedy\u2019s opinion spoke eloquently of the most fundamental values of family, love and liberty.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cNo union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice and family,\u201d Kennedy wrote. \u201cIn forming a marital union, two people become something greater than they once were.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n The Obergefell decision prompted a massive celebration that began outside the Supreme Court on the day it was decided in late June of 2015. That evening, the White House was lit in rainbow colors. Many same-sex couples rushed into courthouses to wed. Nearly 600,000 same-sex couples have since married, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.\n <\/p>\n \n But some conservatives viewed the outcome as a betrayal and predicted future conflicts with religion. Davis, who at the time was the clerk of Rowan County in Kentucky, cited her religious objection to same-sex marriage as justifying her decision to withhold marriage licenses to all couples. She was sued by multiple couples in the county, and a jury ordered her to pay $360,000 in damages and legal fees.\n <\/p>\n \n After a federal court found she had violated a court order to issue licenses, Davis was also thrown in jail for several days.\n <\/p>\n \n Writing in dissent, the late Justice Antonin Scalia blasted the court\u2019s decision as a \u201cthreat to American democracy.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cThe substance of today\u2019s decree is not of immense personal importance to me,\u201d he wrote. \u201cBut what really astounds is the hubris reflected in today\u2019s judicial Putsch.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Davis had argued that it was time \u201cfor a course correction\u201d on Obergefell.\n <\/p>\n \n While virtually all of the focus on Davis\u2019 appeal was aimed at her request to overturn Obergefell, the bulk of case actually dealt with a series of more technical questions. In appealing the damages verdict against her, the former clerk argued that the First Amendment\u2019s religious protections should shield her from legal liability, particularly since she is no longer a public official. The 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that argument.\n <\/p>\n \n Several conservatives justices had signaled in recent weeks that there was no great appetite to reopen Obergefell. Barrett told the\u202fNew York Times<\/em><\/a> last month there are \u201cvery concrete reliance interests\u201d at stake when it comes to same-sex marriage. Alito, while criticizing the precedent broadly during an address in Washington earlier this fall, stressed that it was a \u201cprecedent of the court that is entitled to the respect afforded by the doctrine of stare decisis.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n At the same time, there have been worrying signs for LGBTQ rights groups \u2013 particularly when it comes to cases involving transgender Americans. In recent months, the high court handed down a major decision allowing states to ban the use of puberty blockers and hormone therapy<\/a> for trans youth, allowed the Trump administration to bar transgender Americans from serving in the military and allowed the administration to require US passports to include sex markers consistent with a person\u2019s sex at birth<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n The Supreme Court\u2019s decision to decline to hear the Davis appeal sets no precedent. If another appeal arrives threatening to undermine or overturn Obergefell, the court will review that appeal from scratch.\n <\/p>\n \n This story was updated with additional details about the case.<\/em>\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n The Supreme Court on Monday declined an opportunity to overturn its landmark precedent recognizing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, tossing aside an appeal that had roiled LGBTQ advocates who feared the conservative court might be ready to revisit the decade-old decision. Instead, the court denied an appeal from Kim Davis, the former Kentucky county … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9335,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Supreme-Court-declines-to-revisit-landmark-same-sex-marriage-precedent.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9334"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9336,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9334\/revisions\/9336"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"